Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Godzilla:King of the Monsters (1985) Unfilmed

Many years before Roland Emmerich brought Godzilla to the big screen Hollywood style there was an attempt to bring him to film in a US version written by Fred Dekker (Monster Squad,Robocop 3) and directed by Steve Miner (House,Forever Young,Friday the 13th Parts 2 & 3)To be titled Godzilla:King of the Monsters this film was to be filmed in 3D, and the story was said to be very similar to Gorgo in which a mother dinosaur seeks her young who have been taken.

Rick Baker was approached to create and animatronic Godzilla head with a complete range of cable controlled expressions. David Allen was sought to do the complex Stop-Motion effects and FX house ILM and Dreamquest were contacted for FX bids.

William Stout (Conan the Barbarian,The Return of the Living Dead,Pan's Labyrinth) was hired to be the films production designer and he was also to produce a full colour teaser poster to tantalize potential investors. Stout also storyboarded 90-95% of the project along with artist such as Doug Wilder, creator of Johnny Quest. Scenes in the film were to include Godzilla destroying the Golden Gate bridge along with destruction of cable cars, buildings, people etc.... In the end he ends up on Alcatraz and is killed by having a nuclear missile shot down his throat, I'm sure that won't have done the city much good either. He was still going to be a fire/radiation spewing creature. Animator David Allen was unsure whether 3D composite Stop-Motion FX were possible and so was reluctant to take on the work.

In the end this project was deemed too expensive and too risky by studio executives for what was a B Movie character like Godzilla